I think I'm right in saying that 'The Chief' you refer to has just been had up for illegal waste disposal on another piece of land, along with a number of his cronies.
I know this bloke from a run in with him many years ago. Others who have had the unfortunate experience of his scheming will also testify to his slippery character. I don't think his plan to aquire that site will succeed given his highly nefarious past and the sooner he is ousted from there the better.
As for claiming the land without paying rent, he's going to lose out on several points. Firstly he will need to show he has made every effort to locate the land owner and inform him of his intentions.
If the land owner cannot be found, then a 'rent' is payed to a solicitor who holds on to this money untill either the landowner is located and negotiations can take place or a period of time elapses (however long that may be these days) which will give the 'Squatter' a posessory title.
Lots of grey areas in this section of land law and also a good few loopholes..on both sides!
Curiously, the Concord book does not mention anything about negotiations with landowners or mineral right owners.
However, I think I may know someone who can help answer these questions; it's just a case of tracking him down now.
I know the locals objected to the mine being opened which imposed certain restrictions to the planning licence and limited the working hours from 7am to 7pm.

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Hes in for a long wait, its 12 years to claim adverse possession

Apparently, according to the site and quote below the headframe is owned by someone else. Prehaps they would know who owns the land?

The headgear (hoisting framework above ground) is still in place and is owned by Charlie Palmer who hopes to dismantle and re-erect it at Camborne School of Mines.

Taken from: http://www.compactfiction.com/blackwatermansell.php 


This being a recent article about the man mentioned in the quote: http://www.thisiscornwall.co.uk/westbriton/stagnes/Parishioners-efforts-officially-recognised/article-1205685-detail/article.html 

My father and Charlie are great friends. He's a really nice bloke. I am sure that he would want to see our Cornish mining heritage respected and conserved.

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It's probably quite sensible to watch out for the perjorative labels of people! It may make them less negotiable.

I gather from what I recall, the company were about 80% owners of the site, of which Bradford and Bingley had a 20% stake. As the company is now dissolved, I gather that the land has no owner. If anyone, B&B would have had the greatest claim, but I gather this could only happen before the company was dissolved. So, the land would have been up for grabs, including by Duchy's (employed) land grabber. I recall that the appropriate channels had been gone through and Duchy were "letting them use it, as they had bigger fish to fry". Anyway, the shaft is one of the more important ones on the minerals plan. No building within a 150m radius.

I'm not sure about the headgear, but the guy I spoke to was nice and really, they'd (them and Duchy) would probably be up for shifting it. With a chat with another chap, I gather the MM would be up for having the headgear on the winding shaft, BUT couldn't afford to have it moved.
I have a feeling it may have arrived mostly in one piece and was craned into position.

I wonder where the best access point would be for a future working of that area. Since the fields have been sold (dumps) and I gather these are occupied (officially) by "our man".

Anyway, there is a fair bit of opinion in the above and it should all be taken with a pinch of salt.

Since I read this, I picked up a copy of Trounson's other book "Cornish Mineral Industry" and was surprised to note a comment about drainage. This got me thinking that since North Downs/Scorrier will probably be revisited at some point, how will this be approached.

Trounson notes that North Downs is connected to the County Adit and one of the major snags (that affected Wheal Concord) was the state of the adit along the way. It would be a nightmare to rectify, so the British Non-Ferrous Mineral Development company (that GAP Moorhead worked for) proposed to drive a new deep adit from the coast.

That is a massive undertaking and I wonder whether a modern company would attempt this, if not, what would they do in order to facilitate drainage. I note from various sources that Crofty made a particular effort (and I assume will continue to) regarding the maintenance of Dolcoath Deep Adit.

I assume the savings in pumped height are similar today (with plant food gas hysteria) as they were in the days of pricey Welsh Coal).

Would an adit be driven from the North Coast and if so, would there be "hell up" from the yoghurt weavers?

Good book, that second Trounson one....

The issue is the size a new adit would be, as it would not be possible to drive it to the size of the old adits due to elf an safety, I would have thought it would be more likely to drive throught to the Tolgus Valley.